


It Gets Better

by yikesola



Series: Commissions [6]
Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: 2019, Established Relationship, Introspection, M/M, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-15
Updated: 2019-09-15
Packaged: 2020-10-19 11:42:08
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20656658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yikesola/pseuds/yikesola
Summary: The air in the waiting room is too hot. Dan is hoping his therapist’s office is cooler— it usually is, she has a fan that she always turns on when he walks in— but he also is sitting with that heavy feeling in his stomach that today is going to be a hard day, and the room being stifling would just be part of his luck.A fic about self-empathy and good sessions.





	It Gets Better

**Author's Note:**

> This was a commissioned piece for [ahappydnp](http://ahappydnp.tumblr.com/) 💞

The air in the waiting room is too hot. There are no open windows. It’s stale. Dan can feel a bit of sweat at the back of his bare knees, his grid shorts a necessity in July but not soaking the dampness in a way his jeans would. He’s hoping his therapist’s office is cooler— it usually is, she has a fan that she always turns on when he walks in— but he also is sitting with that heavy feeling in his stomach that today is going to be a hard day, and the room being stifling would just be part of his luck. 

He gets that feeling sometimes, if he goes into a session not really sure what it is he wants to bring up or unpack, but knowing that it’s gonna be something heavy and he’ll be tired as hell afterwards. 

He has it now, as he reaches for his phone in his pocket and texts Phil, “_takeout for dinner? something greasy please_” because he suspects he’s gonna need it. He silences his phone after Phil’s emoji response, slips it back into his pocket, and looks up because the door across the way has just opened. The person in the session before his slips out of the therapist’s room. Dan keeps his gaze respectfully at the person’s ankles. The walk out of the room is always a little raw, even in an easy session. 

The door closes again, and Dan knows there’s a quick jotting of notes going on in that room, the moleskin notebook she keeps by her mason jar of cold brew getting some new information. She won’t be long. Then she’ll open the door again and it’ll be Dan’s turn. 

In the few minutes that takes, Dan’s phone buzzes once more. He doesn’t check it. He’ll get to it after. 

He hears the door open, sees his therapist standing with a smile. “Dan,” she says, “good to see you.” 

*

This is only his second therapy session since coming out. The first one had been a lot of exuberance, a lot of “I dunno, it just doesn’t actually feel real sometimes” from him and a lot of “This is something you deserve,” from her. The first one had started with him sitting in the waiting room and seeing himself as a trending topic, still, on too many fucking websites for him to understand. 

The first one had ended with her folding her hands and saying, “Are you comfortable with something personal from me?” the way she always carefully asks, and him nodding, and her continuing, “My coming out looked a lot like the one you had last month with your family. I think few people have the coming out you’ve just had online. But even with those happy responses and hugs and reassurances that I was loved, there was still a very instinctual fear that took time to be unlearned. And I felt very ungrateful for a while, that coming out didn’t magically fix all my old anxieties. So, you’re buzzing right now. You’re riding the high. Enjoy it,” she nodded, “And when you come back down to earth, I want you to remember that you aren’t being ungrateful. You’re being human. And we can talk more about that when it hits.” 

This second session after coming out begins with him wanting to pick up that thread. “I dunno if I’m feeling _ungrateful_ exactly. But I’m just feeling like…” he leans back and crosses his arms, “I’m feeling sad. Because I’m so happy.” 

“Sad about being out?” 

“No,” Dan says. “No. Maybe.” He clears his throat. 

His therapist smiles softly. She is patient. She doesn’t look bored, even when Dan doesn’t speak. That was the problem he’d hit before, with therapists who looked bored like if he couldn’t find the right words for a while then he was just wasting their precious time. 

But here and now Dan can take as long as he needs for the words to come to him. “I’m so _relieved_. Like everything that was weighing me down for so long has finally been thrown off. And I’m happy. But it makes me sad for those years that were weighed down.” 

She nods. “Those years were really hard on Past Dan,” she says. 

“Yeah,” he shrugs. “I agreed to this campaign with Young Minds next month about posting childhood photos and saying nice things about that kid because of self-empathy and all that.”

She nods again. “It sounds very effective.” 

“I guess. Yeah, it is. The thing is, five-year-old Dan isn’t who I have beef with. That kid was cute and poised and infectiously happy. It’s not a chore to pump him up. But I feel so sad for the Dan in between five and 28. Like, 17-year-old Dan was a mess.”

“It’s helpful to separate these stages of you into separate people, but let’s remember that this is all still _you_.” 

Dan nods, “I know.”

“What did 17-year-old Dan need to hear? If 5-year-old Dan is doing just fine, what words of encouragement do you need to give to 17-year-old Dan?” 

It stumps him for a second. There are a lot of quick answers that come to mind, things that would’ve made 17-year-old Dan lose his shit. Things like being prank called by Pete Wentz or the entirety of the _hey buddy you in London_ fiasco. Basically just things like “You’re not going to be locked alone in your room forever. People are gonna know who you are, in some godforsaken capacity.” 

But he also thinks back to an exercise he’s done in therapy before. Where he had to list things that Past Dan needed— which isn’t quite the same thing as what Past Dan needs to _hear_. Very similar, but a little different.

He’d listed things like a best friend, a better dad, a smaller age gap between him and Adrian, some fucking behavioural regulations at his school, a wakeup call for his mum, a clear understanding of the difference between _love_ and being _in love_, early access to mental health resources. Things a lot of 17-year-olds could use. And things, he understood as he listed them and as his therapist smiled, he’d managed to get over the years for the most part. Where it mattered. And the other things he didn’t get mattered less as time went on. 

But this time he thinks about what 17-year-old Dan needs to hear, and he’s not sure he can come up with something that covers it all. 

“Is ‘it gets better’ stupid and cliché?” he asks wryly. 

“No,” she smiles, “It’s accurate. But maybe try something a little more specific.” 

Dan leans forward with his elbows on his knees. The oscillating fan is as consistent as his breathing. Intentionally. He’s thinking, thinking, thinking. This is all work he’s done already, more or less. To get to the place he is now. But the words are hard, somehow. “I wanna tell him it’s okay. He’s doing the best he can. It’s okay that he’s gonna get fired from Asda and it’s okay that he’s gonna drop out of uni and it’s okay that he’s gonna almost be outed like four times. It won’t feel okay. And the way he’ll respond won’t really be all that okay. But like…” he leans back. He runs his hand over his face. “It’s not even just that things get better. Or that they get really, really good. Which they do. But also… it’s okay.” 

“Okay is pretty darn good when things haven’t been okay for a long while,” she nods. 

Sometimes Dan doesn’t look at his therapist’s face when they’re talking. He knows that’s rude. But he doesn’t. Sometimes he looks at her crossed feet on the patterned rug. Sometimes he looks towards the window which only shows a stripe of blue sky and the building beside them. Sometimes he looks at her bookshelf and doesn’t focus on any of the titles but instead at the books’ different heights and thicknesses and colours. Then sometimes she’ll say something that makes him turn to look right at her. 

The decade-old reference of _okay is wonderful_ is on the tip of his tongue. He bites it back. Even if it would be fitting. 

*

Dan’s been on his way home and underground for four minutes before he remembers that his phone had buzzed a little over an hour ago. He pulls it out of his pocket and sees a text from Phil. “_Got an email from vidcon now. They’re really leaning into the 10yrs thing and wanna have us react to old videos_”

Dan clicks over to his email real quick and sees he’s gotten one too. “_should be fun_” he texts back, unsure how much of that is sarcastic. Part of him thinks it should actually be torturous. Part of him thinks it would’ve been, a month ago. 

It probably won’t be so bad anymore. Because the Dan in those old videos was doing his best, after all. And because things worked out just fine. 

A banner alert drops into his view. It’s got his face in the tiny thumbnail, along with a whole host of people that came out last month. There’s been a steady stream of those alerts and yet they still surprise him. He wonders if any of the old bullies see his face in their news notifications. He wonders how 17-year-old Dan would feel about that. 

When he gets off the tube and steps back into the open air of London, there is a breeze courtesy of the cars driving past him. It’s not exactly fresh air, but it’ll do. 

Phil had timed his arrival well; the takeaway had been sitting on the counter for a mere three minutes. It’s a nice evening, and they’re gonna sit on the balcony as it slips into night and slowly cools. Before they dig in, Phil pulls Dan into a hug and they stand like that for a while by the open balcony door. Feeling, breathing, being. “Good session?” Phil asks. 

Dan’s not sure what he means by that. Good in the sense that he didn’t cry, or that it felt like nothing more than an expensive and pleasant chat? Good in the sense that he chipped away at a heavy stone that’s always on his chest? A good session can be a lot of things. Dan figures Phil just means is he good right now. 

And he is. So he nods. 

“Yeah,” he says as he traces his hands along Phil’s back. Tracing nothing, spirals and loops.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading— come say hi on [tumblr](http://yikesola.tumblr.com/post/187741909794/it-gets-better) !


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